Originally Posted by
WHBM
A BEA Comet 4B doing a similar power check did override the chocks, lunged forward, and crashed into hangar doors ahead, which fell forward onto unlucky Trident 'PI which was inside. It was repaired, but was lost shortly afterwards in the Staines accident, and initial investigation was whether the repairs had somehow failed.
Interesting, I'd never heard of that one.
Papa India must have had a very unlucky life. Prior to the Staines disaster it had its tail chopped off in the 1968 Ambassador crash at LHR (which was also looked at as part of the Staines investigation).
So it sounds like the hangar incident may have happened while it was being repaired, or some time following its return to service in February 1969.
I remember doing 4-engine runups on Merchantmen where we were pointing at the hangars, but by the time I joined BEA (just as the last Comet was being retired) all the jet detuners were oriented so that aircraft pointed out towards the airfield, so no likelihood of any repetition.